IN THE AMERICAN CONGRESS.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 9642, 17 January 1903, Page 5 (Supplement)

IN THE AMERICAN CONGRESS.

PECULIARITIES OF THE •MOST YANKEE INSTITUTION ON EARTH. Congress, which has assembled this week, is titae most American tiling m America. Not even Mrs Carrie Nation herself is more native to that piquant soil than the national Legislature. You catch the American note, the note of unmitigated democracy, on the very threshold of the Capitol. Anyone can enter who cares to, without reference to age, color, or sex, "previous condition of servitude," or present condition of clothing. ■ Millionaire or tramp, black or white, the Capitol is yours to roam m at will. If you can find a vaoant seat hi the public galleries . from which to listen to the speechet, you are welcome to it. There, are no tickets or passes or credentials of any sort to bother about; no gauntlet of slightly suspicious officials to be- run. .Liberty can go no further; and the system is so easy and convenient that one is ready to ' overlook its unpleasant features, and to conclude that the sight ot some ragged shuffle of a man, whom no second-rate hotel would have allowed to *entor its lobby, lounging about m the precincts of the national Legislature, is not, after all, without its compensations. A LETTER- WRITING AUDIENCE. The House of Representatives is an enormous chamber — three times as big as the House of Commons* — yet so admirably proportioned that its vastness goes unnoticed. The seats are arranged, not m parallel lines, as with us, but after the Continental fashion, m curved, rows, facing the Speaker, the Republicans being always to tlie left of the Chair, and the Democrats always to the right. Each member has a revolving armchair, with a spacious desk m front of it, where he can write letters and busy himself among his papers m a way that must be horribly disconcerting to an opponent m debate. On the opening day of a session these desks and armchairs are overloaded with bouquets of "American beauties" and other flowers, sent by admiring constituents. Even from the Press ga.llery, above the Speaker's chair, it is eften impossible to. see more than the top of a populai member's head above the wealth of floral compliments. It is when you begin to watch the galleries and the behaviour of members on the floor that the interest grows. It is three years since I was last m Congress. I lie occasion was one of some interest-, as Utah had elected as its representative a Mormon with three wives, and the great American public was brist'ing witli indignation. LADIES AND THK MORMON. Some three thousand determined ladiet took early possession of the galleries, and fairly sniffed down the hapless Mormon when he rose to speak. lf-"he-had had thirty wives they could not have disposed of. him more effectually; and whenevei anything said or done on the floor tickled their fancy, they joined m the laughter and applause unchecked. That made us all feel very much at home. These exubex*ant ladies were not th« only feature that inspired a pleasant sense of 'domesticity. Behind the last row ol chairs and desks runs a railing hung with drapery, and between the railing and the walls is a passage-way opening on to smoking-rooms. From my seat m the Press Gallery 1 could watch honorable members lolling m their seats and cigars ; and as they took care to leave the doors of the smoking-rooms open, that no word of the speeches might be lost, a very appetising odour of tobacco was propagated throughout the House. , , Then I was greatly interested m the barber's shop, close by tlie amokin-j rooms, and- equally visible from, where I sa' ( Kis not m every Legislature that the Speaker and the journalists above him can catch glimpses of members under the razor. ■ - - s • • Democracy, indeed, took on quite a new significance for me when the colored barber, finding business dull, opened the door, and, standing m his shirt-sleeve's and barber's apron, half m and half out of the shop, joked with Congressmen and listened to the speeches till they bored him. . ■ JUVENILE LEGISLATORS. But for sheer homeliness the palm must be given to a phalanx' of small boys, the sons of Congressmen, who sat on their fathers' knee^ during the debates. The colored member, I was enraptured to see, brought his little piccaninny along. Some of these infants, tiring of the paternal lap, would climb into the nearest chair, and their experiment with its rotary mechanism, and the Congressmen to whom the chair belonged, so far from making any effort to expel the intruder, would smile a lank smile and walk off for a/ cigar. One urchin came up to the Bar of the House with his father to be sworn m, held up his little fist and took the oath of allegiance to the Constitution. And the only comment I heard from the galleries was an admiring, "Well, isn't that just, the 'cutest thing you ever saw ?" In the American House of Representatives, as in 'Some qf our Colonial Legislatures, great use is' made of pages. When their . services are not required they 101 l about by the table beneath the Speaker's chair, or : play surreptitious games m its shadow, with a watchful eye on the sergeant-at-arms. Like tlie spectators m the galleries,. they do not disdain to join occasionally m the applause. What with the immensity of the House, the buzz of the galleries, the- calling for the pages, the scratching of pens, the crumpling of newspapers, the banging of desk-lids, and the thump, thump of the Speaker's gavel, it needs a' man with a powerful voice to make- himself heard. THE GARB OF THE HOUSE. .As a matter of fact, complete silence is so far from being obtained that members who particularly wish -to hear what is being said leave their seats and gather round the orator, just behind the official stenographers, who take down his speech standing. '".'■ ■'-.- Tlie House of Commons is beyond all rivalry the best-dressed assembly m the world. The American House of Representatives, with equal emphasis, is the worst. The usual Congressional costume is a long and very, loose frock-coat, a low-cut waist-coat, and a turned-down collar, a white bow, and a Derby or felt hat. „-....' . No man can look, imposing m such a dress ; and, indeed, at first glance you might easily take Congress for an assembly of Dissenting ministers. Not more than two or three members at the outside come up to the Fifth Avenue standard. It is thicy they do not wear their hats m the- House, and to that extent appear more dignified than our.M.P.'s. On the other hand, they are much given to "dry smokes," that is, to chewing unlighted cigars. •-.--.-.• That is .not only a distressing habit m itself, at any rate to the onlookers, but it leads to another that may perhaps relieve the Congressmen who practice it, but that cannot help doing some damage to tlie' patterns of the carpets. — Sydney B/ooks, m Daily Express.